Brute Force (1947)

Interesting prison drama.Joe Collins (played by Burt Lancaster) is a prisoner in Westgate Penitentiary. The senior officer at the prison is Captain Munsey (Hume Cronyn), a power-mad, manipulative sadist. Collins is rebellious and constantly in trouble with the prison guards. He formulates a plan to escape but a confrontation with Captain Munsey is inevitable...An interesting look at prison life, and how people act when they have absolute power. The central plot was well thought out and made for a good story. However, the stories of how all the main prisoner-characters got there sometimes seemed unnecessary and felt like padding.Solid work by Burt Lancaster and Hume Cronyn in the lead roles. Good supporting performances too.

BRUTE FORCE begins with some beautiful rain-drenched establishing shots of Westgate prison. We hear "Calypso" (Sir Lancelot, a face- and voice- familiar to fans of Val Lewton's films) singing a rhyming introduction (which is infused with the kind of irony we find in his songs in I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE); he attends to the needs of the sadistic captain of the guards, Munsey (Hume Cronyn). Warns the prison doctor: the prison is "one big human bomb," just waiting to be triggered. Collins (Burt Lancaster), fresh out of solitary confinement, turns out to be that trigger. Collins times a visit to the doctor to coincide with the murder of the stool pigeon whose testimony landed him in solitary (and thereby provides himself a foolproof alibi). Collins later snarls, to Gallagher, who runs the prison newspaper (who points out that the stoolie killing will bring down the authorities on everybody in the prison): "I don't care about everybody else." "That's cemetery talk," replies Gallagher. "There's no such thing as a short stretch," Lancaster states flatly. He's determined to get back to his wheelchair-bound girl as soon as he can (as she's taken a turn for the worse). BRUTE FORCE is a beautifully crafted, uncompromising movie with an unforgettable ending. Highly recommended.

What a spectacular film! If Brute Force is ever remade by Universal, the brutality would have to seem more real, and the threat to the men more real, so that their plans to escape seem more essential for their very freedom. What aids this story are the flashbacks. The viewer gets to see how and why the men got to prison in the first place. The background information helps to understand the predicaments more clearly. It helps to see the moments in which their love for women almost redeemed them. The story seems to indicate that if you're going to die, there needs to be that dream which a man must cling to, that salvation somewhere in his head, even if it's no longer attainable.

The basic story is not original, and you always have a feeling that you know how things might go, but ...This is a movie that comes together the way that movies should.Excellent acting by an array of capable performers, great pacing that keeps you hooked but let's you breathe, back-stories are filled in so that you can relate to the prisoners as well as the warders.Burt Lancaster is young and full or fire. Hume Cronyn plays the 'little' captain well as a man with power beyond his capabilities. Given the year of making there may have been more than a dig at Nazi sympathizers. The black and white video makes the conditions all the more stark - as are their options.In an era where movies need to have lots of explosions, fantasy creatures or, pointless swearing to attract an audience it is good to see how a 'proper' movie can be made.